Grounding in a Sacred Circle
God talks to all of us through whatever we focus our attention on.
Yesterday I attended a Sacred Women’s Circle for the Aquarius new moon. Words can’t describe the magic of wild women sharing deep intuitive insights, while crying and howling in a circle. We, in fact, summoned a small bird into the tipi while we held hands in a synchronized dance around the fire. The tenderness, love, and synchronicities of these ceremonies keeps me on the path towards my highest purpose. Gathering with the moon phases also allows us to be in harmony with our instincts and inclinations.
It all began last year when I attended my first full moon meditation for the second Aquarius full moon, which is quite different from a sacred circle, but still powerful in its own right. I didn’t even know what the fuck I was there for at all. I even told one of the facilitators that, as I awkwardly walked through the front door. I didn’t speak up when they asked if anyone had something to share, I accidentally held my breath for a very long time when I wasn’t expressly instructed to exhale, and I didn’t really try to network afterward. Yet, I still felt like something had changed within me after I left.
At this time in my life, I was very lonely. Which is fitting because I, myself, have an Aquarius moon (often stereotyped as the weird and lone-wolf rebel by modern astrologers.) That night I was scouting, on the hunt, desperately searching for a community that did not require me to conform to their beliefs. I’d been abandoned by many of the people I thought were friends (in my mind) and these comforting strangers were a warm reprieve from the sorrow within which I’d been allowing myself to wallow.
Yesterday, I was following the meditation which instructed us to leave our bodies (through the connected heart and third eye chakras), up and out into space to see the Earth from above. I was no longer a body, but a bright light amongst all the other stars. I saw the beautiful planet with clouds covering the swaths of blue and patches of brown and green. It was calm, peaceful, and like Carl Sagan’s Pale Blue Dot epiphany, I remembered that was home. While I looked for a message, I kept having flashes of my earthly great-great grandmother, whom I’ve never met. She was in a rocking chair on the porch of an old dusty home in the middle of nowhere. As I continued to try to get back to that place in outer space, my sole ancestor continued to cut in.
She knew I’d be enticed by the serenity of the heavens. She wanted me to remember how beautiful the tensions between opposing forces can be. She gave me the analogy of a fire with all it’s burning passion. “Do not smother it, contain it. The answers to all of your questions lie within the dynamics of the struggle”. It is all about learning about ourselves. I know myself more when I observe my own reactions to inconveniences that arise based on traumas I’ve experienced in the past.
I am meant to heal those wounds and not spread them to others. That passionate fire that burns within me has all the creative potential in the universe, as the eternal flame exists within every star. It is my duty to ensure that fire is only a spectacle to marvel after and not a weapon with which to hurt my fellow humans. It is spark of inspiration to pull people out of their mass hypnosis of self indulgence and into the mesmerizing embers of awe.
I remember yesterday thinking how incredible it was that the little bird flew into the tipi during our dance. It seemed like a miracle. I later found out that not everyone saw the bird, but fortunately the woman next to me did. We had shared a beautiful giggle and continued to participate in the movement of the group. In that moment, the dual nature of the individual existence and community warmed my heart. Then it occurred to me that I was so attuned to the energy we were manifesting, that I noticed. That’s all it really takes for these little miracles to show up in our lives: that we pay attention to them.
With the completion of this lunar cycle, I feel more connected to myself, the planet, and the humans that inhabit it. I’ll be facilitating the next sacred women’s circle for the Pisces new moon, and it is a great honor to have the talking stick sitting atop my altar. These rituals that we share deeply embedded in our history are the antidote to a life of hard labor and loneliness. I’ve grown so much in this spiritual journey: from a lost girl who knew nothing about community, to being a part of a kind and loving one rooted in the practices carried out by our separate ancestral lines. We all come together with a shared origin like the mycelial threads spawn from a single spore into a a beautiful mushroom fruiting-body.
Originally written in Collective Journaling at The Stoa
